


The Strut and Trade of Charms

by voleuse



Category: Transformers (Bayverse)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-01-01
Updated: 2008-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-04 02:51:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voleuse/pseuds/voleuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>I labour by singing light</em>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Strut and Trade of Charms

**Author's Note:**

> Set after the movie. Title and summary adapted from Dylan Thomas's _In My Craft Or Sullen Art_.

Sam was the golden boy of human-bot relations, and Mikaela was completely fine with that. As long as she didn't get walled away from the action, like that first time when a bunch of suits stood in front of her and she had to kick one of them in the stomach before they'd call anybody who would actually recognize her.

When Sam finally got to see her, she was cuffed to the stand for a television set, drinking a grape soda.

"Mikaela?" he said, and he looked kind of scared.

"Hey, Sam." She set her soda down on the table nearby. "They take their national security really serious around here."

He laughed, and he told her he'd call someone. (Before, she would have thought he was showing off. Not anymore.) At his wave, one of the agents uncuffed her, and this time she kneed him in the groin.

*

 

The Autobots didn't take to national security any better than Mikaela did, and she found herself with them, in an open field, more often than not. The scientists could ooh and aah, hem and haw all they wanted, but when it came right down to it, Mikaela spoke the 'bot language better.

She found out one afternoon, after Bumblebee had been limping in his 'bot form. He transformed into the Camaro, and on a whim, Mikaela asked him to pop his hood. After propping it up, she took a look inside, and didn't find anything different from the first time she had peered into the machinery.

Knowing this was _Bumblebee_, however, that these were his metal and wire guts, she suddenly understood. "Your hydraulics are probably gumming up," she deduced aloud. "You could switch to a new--" She paused, stroked a gentle hand against the edge of his transmission. "Is it okay if I work on you? Like that?"

There was a quick spark against her fingers, not even enough to sting, and then the radio was playing Aerosmith.

Mikaela laughed, and went to fetch her kit.

*

 

This is the way the suits could find the Autobots, on any given day:

Sam would be lounging against a tree, rambling on about economics and philosophy and science fiction with whatever 'bot felt like trying to understand the fragile human psyche that day.

Mikaela would be a few yards away, grease smudging her cheeks, her arms, her nose. She'd be elbow-deep around a carburetor, or rotating tires, or arguing with some stubborn 'bot about an oil change.

And sometimes she'd laugh, for the sheer absurdity of it all, and Sam would look over at her, and Bumblebee would sing.


End file.
